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Speaker 1: A question for you, who out there wants a pay rise?

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Speaker 1: Who out there deserves a pay rise? Simple question and

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Speaker 1: quite an easy answer. The answer is, of course, everybody,

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Speaker 1: and who deserves one will. Most of us do buy

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Speaker 1: and large. We're hard workers and we deserve more. Teachers, nurses, doctors,

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Speaker 1: buy and large. Yes, yes, yes. At the weekend we

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Speaker 1: had more reports of a doctor shortage in Fakatana. This

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Speaker 1: time last week it was the teacher shortage, and the

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Speaker 1: union came out and said, what unions say, throw some

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Speaker 1: cash at it, higher salaries, more staff. Problem solved. The

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Speaker 1: problem is not what to do, but how do you

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Speaker 1: pay for it? Remember, our government is borrowing money from

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Speaker 1: overseas lenders to pay for everyday items like teachers salaries,

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Speaker 1: fixing roads, and paying welfare operational spending. We're paying interest

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Speaker 1: on that borrowing. That interest bill is the highest it's

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Speaker 1: ever been in our nation's history. Even with a national

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Speaker 1: act and government who are meant to be the right ones,

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Speaker 1: we will keep borrowing for this stuff and won't start

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Speaker 1: paying it back until at least twenty thirty. Most know

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Speaker 1: the uncomfortable truth about a situation. We're no longer the wealthy, productive,

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Speaker 1: and plentiful country that we used to be. So rather

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Speaker 1: than simply saying we need to be paid more, we

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Speaker 1: deserve to be paid more, which nobody disagrees with, we

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Speaker 1: need to ask how how do we make this a wealthy,

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Speaker 1: prosperous country which can afford to do that? The Aussies

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Speaker 1: are paying twenty five thirty percent more, but they mind

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Speaker 1: the but Jesus out of the place. We sell tourism

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Speaker 1: but moan when there are too many campavans on the road.

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Speaker 1: We turn our nose up at gold digging in Otago,

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Speaker 1: a region founded on doing exactly that. We put the

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Speaker 1: boot into our farmers, who are about the most productive

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Speaker 1: on Earth and who provide protein, nutrients and goodness to

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Speaker 1: forty million people globally. It's easy to demy things, but

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Speaker 1: it's not so easy to pay for them. That's the

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Speaker 1: real challenge, not just for a government, this government, the

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Speaker 1: next one, whoever it might be, but for every single

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Speaker 1: one of us. In twenty twenty six. For more from

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Speaker 1: Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live to News Talks

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Speaker 1: at b from five am weekdays, or follow the podcast

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Speaker 1: on iHeartRadio.